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9.23.2009

The L'eau Down: Installation Shots from "Slippery When Wet"

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I'll have paparazzi pics on Friday, but I wanted to show you installation shots ofSlippery When WetatMetaphor Contemporary Art, in which I have work. Obviously I can't review the show, but I can describe and discuss it--a diverse thematic show in which water asserts itself abstractly and representationally, in color and in black and white.

View from the front door: Foreground, Andrew Mockler, Untitled, 72 x 49 inches; three paintings from the Ocean series by Peter Schroth, each oil on paper mounted on canvas, 28 x 28 inches; two framed photographs from the Water Studies series by Don Muchow, archival inkjet prints; a grid of 18 of my Silk Road paintings, most 2009, all encaustic on panel, 12 x 12 inches

The images, courtesy of the gallery, begin at the front entrance and sweep around clockwise. Let me say that I love Andrew Mockler's paintings, beautiful canvases that compress a thousand sunrises and sunsets into coolly formal compositions of horizontal stripes. You can see a large one, above, which is just to your left as you enter the gallery. (The gallery itself, a beautiful white cube with an enormous glass-front overhead door, must have started life as a garage. It would be completely at home on 24th Street next door to Gagosian or Mary Boone.)

Continuing around: Schroth, Muchow, Mattera

Peter Schroth and Don Muchow-- painter and photographer, above--have much in common with their water studies. Each captures the movement of the ocean. Schroth, working in oil on paper en plein air, depicts its turbulence, while Muchow, working in black and white photography, finds the moment between ebb and flow--like the still point after an exhalation.

My grid of Silk Road paintings, each 12x12, encaustic on panel

When Julian Jackson and Rene Lynch, the owner/directors of Metaphor, invited me to participate with an installation of Silk Road paintings, I allowed the aqueous theme to flow into my consciousness. The result are the paintings you see above, which are more atmospheric, more referential to the ocean than I would normally have done. I loved having the opportunity to stretch in this way. There are ridges suggestive of waves, and graduated color suggestive of horizons. I haven't become a seascape painter, of course. I retain my minimalist sensibility. But let's call it "minimalist with benefits." (You can see some individual workshere.)

Suzan Batu, Slurpee, oil on canvas, 72 x 72 inches; Susan Homer, Rainy Day Painting, oil on canvas, 55 x 48 inches. Batu's work is all about the flow, while Homer's have a quiet lyricism inspired by the garden on a rainy day

Andrew Mockler's four gouache-on-paper studies are shown over the desk, above, and on their own, below

Climb the winding staircase in the back corner of the gallery and you reach a narrow second level. Normally it's a project space, but for this show it holds a continuation of the show. I have a larger work up here. Muchow and Mockler also have work. Nancy Manter has photographs as well. Manter's work is in the street-level window of the gallery, and that will be the first image you see in the paparazzi post on Friday, but for here, take a peek at this loge-like space. Below it is a closer view of one of Manter's works.

"Minimalist with benefits"- a fitting term; it rather describes my work, too.I would have greatly enjoyed seeing this show in person but since that wasn't possible, your blogs posts are the next best thing- almost like being there.

MIAMI!

Links

Second Edition Published

“Silk Road: Excerpts From an Ongoing Series” has been published to mark 10 years of my involvement with one series, whose aesthetic I describe as “lush minimalism.” You can view the 56-page book in its entirety online at no charge. Click pic to view

Artists Choose Artists

Artist Annell Livingston writes about my work for the new blog, Vasari 21, founded by Ann Landi. Click pic for info and a link

Recent Solo: "Silk Road"

"Joanne Mattera: The Silk Road Series" was at Kenise Barnes Fine Art in Larchmont, New York, May-July. Some paintings are available for viewing at the gallery. Click pic for gallery info

Recent: August Geometry

More than just a summer show. Au-gust: adjective, respected and impressive. At the Marcia Wood Gallery, Atlanta. Click pic for info

Recent

I'm having a great year of exhibitions and catalogs. This volume, published by Space Gallery, Denver, on the occasion of the exhibition, "Pattern: Geometric|Organic," is viewable online and available for sale as a hard-copy volume. Click pic for exhibition info and a link to the catalog. That's my "Chromatic Geometry 29" on the cover

James Panero Reviews Doppler Shift

Writing in The New Criterion, Panero calls Doppler Shift "a smart group show, " noting the work of "artists who interest me most these days." There's a nice shout out to Mary Birmingham, the curator; to Mel Prest, who originated the concept; and to me, among others. Click pic for the review

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"Textility," curated by Mary Birmingham and myself for the Visual Art Center of New Jersey, Summit (where Birmingham is the chief curator), looked at contemporary painting, sculpture and work on paper in which textile elements were referenced or employed. The exhibition is over, but you can see this exhibition on line. Click on the links below to read and see more.

Review of Textility

Click pic to access review. Then click on page images to enlarge them for legibility

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About Me

THE FIRST CONTEMPORARY BOOK ON ENCAUSTIC PAINTING. AND STILL THE BEST

My book, The Art of Encaustic Painting, was published by Watson-Guptill in 2001. It's the first commercially published book on contemporary encaustic. There are three sections: history, with images of the famed Greco-Egyptian Fayum portraits; a gallery of contemporary painting and sculpture (including the work of Jasper Johns, Kay WalkingStick, Heather Hutchison, Johannes Girardoni and myself), and technical information, including an interview with Michael Duffy, a conservator at the Museum of Modern Art.